A shuttered nursing home that was one of Deer Isle’s biggest employers and the only skilled care facility within an hour’s drive may be revived if the surrounding communities are willing to chip in for it.
After previously announcing plans to sell off its skilled care beds and seeking other uses for the facility, a board member with the Island Nursing Home last week offered a potential solution to restore the facility that closed last year.
In order to retain skilled nursing care, INH board member Skip Greenlaw suggested that Deer Isle, Stonington and towns on the Blue Hill Peninsula give the nursing home a combined $700,000 — the estimated going price for the rights to the skilled nursing care beds. The nursing home would also need help from the towns with finding and hiring staff and securing workforce housing.
There is strong support across the region to reopen the facility. But that support is accompanied by a wariness over its current leadership, even after board president Ronda Dodge stepped down at the beginning of August.
A community petition from last week called on the home to halt the sale of its beds, provide further financial disclosures and reconstitute its board garnered 1,500 signatures from people throughout the island and the peninsula.
After hearing the nursing home board’s proposal, some town officials are also a bit hesitant to hand over such a sum, especially without well-laid plans for the nursing home’s future.
“It would be a big commitment for me to vote to give this money if I didn’t know what was going on down the line,” said Percy “Joe” Brown, a Deer Isle select board member.
He worried that even with financial support, the home, which closed due to a lack of staff, could end up right back in its current predicament in the near future.
The nursing home has considered reopening without skilled care and operating as a residential care-only facility. Home spokesperson Dan Cashman said that providing skilled care is increasingly difficult due to statewide nursing staff shortages.
Even if the towns did pull together on such an expenditure, retaining skilled care may not be possible.
“Staffing is the paramount issue here with the facility and nursing homes in general,” Cashman said. “I think it’s difficult to say if we do this, then we don’t have to sell off the bed rights.”
The nursing home board, which is down several members and on the hunt for replacements, is in an “all-hands-on-deck” situation, Cashman said. Getting the help from the towns could be the best shot to reopen as a skilled care facility.
“They don’t want to leave any stone unturned,” he said of the board’s current strategy.
In Stonington, select board member Evelyn Duncan felt that the towns’ involvement would be necessary to getting the nursing home running. And while borrowing money could come together as soon as town meeting, the municipalities wouldn’t be able to produce workforce housing overnight nor immediately overcome local concerns about the home’s leadership.
“I hope we can pull it together,” she said. “At least on a limited basis and try to develop it back from there into a very valuable part of our community.”
The nursing home has until next year to get a plan to the state for earlier next year to start the process of renewing its license.